Survey Shows Sensitive Data Goes Astray in Email

Many employees have trouble controlling the release of sensitive information in email.

Nearly half (45%) of employees have accidentally included banking information in email sent to an unintended recipient outside the organization, a new study found.

The Clearswift survey of 600 senior business decision makers and 1,200 employees across the UK, US, Germany, and Australia, shows that more than a quarter of users have been on the receiving end of mis-addressed sensitive information, indicating that the flow of poorly managed private information goes in both directions.

Upon receiving unintended information, 31% of employees say that they would read the email, with 12% admitting they would scroll through to read the entire email chain. Once read, only 27% would delete the email from their inboxes.

Only 45% of employees were familiar with any formal process or course of action for receiving an email from someone in another company in which they were not the intended recipient. Add that to the 22% who admitted that there is no formal process in place at all for such situations, and you have an environment in which an enormous opportunity exists for sensitive information to end up (and stay) in the wrong hands.

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